erudio student loans

[mrsbug]

Hi, I have an old student loan from 1998 which I have been deferring since then as I have never earned enough to pay it back (there are some advantages to being poor )

I recently had a letter from a company called erudio student loans saying they have bought my student loan from the government. All very reassuring about how the t and cs of my loan won't change, etc.

Now I've had the regular deferral letter from them and it's much more detailed than before. They want my bank details which I'm not really happy to give, and they say my details will be checked with a credit reference agency, which I don't think they used to do - my loan has never shown on my credit file.

Has anyone else had this? Do I have to give them this info?

Still sounds dodgy as hell to me.

i agree, they are pulling a swifty. They were probably told it was a grey area and to get consent before doing it to cover themselves.
Its psychological blackmail and its obvious to anyone with half a brain.

Correct. BIS are not in the slightest bit impartial in this. They have a lot to protect from this sale, so I doubt we can trust what they say in the least.

i understand they have been butting heads before this very day about this issue, so no surprise the replies today seem rather tight! Who pays BISs wages? Is it Erudio, or is it us? You would have thought they would side with the 50,000 and not with the 1 company (i am aware how naive that sounds).

@emptycoffers

I sent my deferment form in on 21st March and it was signed for recorded delivery on 22nd March, so a little longer than the 10 working days they are stating it will take

The advisor told me that they are trying to phone people to confirm deferment in the first instance as there is a delay with sending the confirmation letter............

@ Qubit

Yes - exactly - they ONLY have the right to notify CRAs of loans in default

They want us to sign over the right for them to notify ALL loans whether they are in repayment, in default or in deferral.

they really dont seem keen on confirming much in writing...or maybe it is just a coincidence.

The MSE article has been completely re-written! Looks like someone's taking our concerns seriously...

@ erudioed

We must remember that BIS has a lot to protect in this debate

Exactly. I have no doubts that promises were made to Erudio in order to get them to buy what was a worthless asset.

I bet Erudio said it would take these near worthless loans off BIS on the understanding that if they couldn't make it pay, BIS would stump up soe form of minimum return or compensation.

So, BIS will bend us over in the showers to make sure they don't have to pay up to Erudio.

BIS and Erudio are like Dave Cameron & Maria Miller - Dave'll back Maria up until he realises she's going to pull him down with her.

@ TazFrank1

Thanks for that - quite a quick turnaround in the circumstances.

I sent mine about a week later - it'll be interesting to see how that pans out.

I didn't fill in the forms in full and rejected T&C changes but haven't had any contact at all - so I guess I shouldn't expect such a 'quick' reply

thats why i think should we should focus a little on what Erudio is, its history according to company info listed on the net, and their leader etc.
I also think someone should update that info on wikipedia as well, someone who knows how to work the thing.
Ive listed many links for the things ive found so people can interpret things how they see it because i am no expert. Maybe other analyses would be very beneficial about what this company is and who its partners are. That would bring pressure on BIS...there is no doubt that the info i found is all very worrying and should be a watershed for due diligence tests by Government bodies.

@ erudioed

We must remember that BIS has a lot to protect in this debate

BIS have probably given Erudio some sort of contractual undertaking to back them up when the shit hit the fan.

After all, if BIS are contracted to guarantee Erudio a minimum return (and who would pay £160million for dead loans otherwise?) then BIS will want to be sure that Eudio make reasonable efforts to get the debts repayed.

And because Erudio are not a 'public' body, BIS will absolve themselves of responsibilty if Erudio put the thumbscrews on us - while giving them a helping heand in the background by turning a blind eye when Erudio take liberties with the T&Cs.

History ought to have shown BIS that there's enough whistleblowers and muck throwers around for this one to come back and bite Vince Cable on his Royal Mail sell-off arse.... again!

I was writing those sorts of terms on rights to use data in terms and conditions (not for student loans) when the early loans were being awarded. We would always seek to include a right for very wide disclosure (as the clause 16 for those who have it in their contract). Of course that does not mean that political pressure by those with the wide clause 16 may not work to keep the deferments off credit records.

Erudio are still stating we won't be any worse off than if our loans were still managed by SLC, well we know SLC are still handling mortgage style deferrals for thesis etc and are not recording deferrals with CRAs, so maybe that's an avenue we could try and apply pressure. At least we would see if Erudio will put its money where it's mouth is.

I've got a feeling I'm going to be damned whatever I do. I'm self employed and although under the annual limit my income for January and February was unusually high. It's very unlikely that this would continue and March and April are proving that. In the past the SLC have always deferred me with my average monthly income being taken into account. This time around I was looking at sending in my scanned form, last Tax statement and my 2013/14 accounts statement as proof along with a covering email (sending in by email with a scanned form) explaining my status (I was going to use one of the above letters as a starting point for that). Even though I'm eligible to defer and am unlikely to see my income go over the limits I can just imagine them taking one look at my evidence and turn me down based on the possibility of future earning going over the threshold!

Really don't know what to do and need to be getting my deferral off ASAP (my date is 25th May). I was told by Erudio I could email in so figured that would buy me a little extra time, and can get delivery confirmations by using a Google Chrome plug in. I was also told that CRAs wouldn't be informed of deferral unless I was in default, although don't entirely believe that (and mine are pre 1998 loans) but am going to state in my email something about them confirming that to be the case.

Wonder what my chances are? Slim I'm guessing.

What's most worrying is that no one seems to had an actual deferral confirmation yet.

they seem to be buying time i feel, they dont want to put much in writing to see what they can get away with. I think its safe to assume they are checking this forum now.
Winner: being told that, like myself, would surely be an avenue to go through to the ombudsman with if you go through the complaints procedure. I would suggest being told wrong, or lied to to get you to just mail the form back, would raise many issues of trust about why you dont feel it safe to send them such info as they want. Because trust is important right.
As ive said before, anyone with half a brain knows having your info registered with CRAs is a negative. How does the saying go, "anyone who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something or f#ck you". It most certainly isnt "treating borrowers fairly at all times" as the fair processing notice from Erudio states, which again i feel is an avenue for complaint! It is the harshest path Erudio is taking against people who have done nothing wrong.

right, a rather worrying development, and a an issue of concern previously voiced here by many about Erudio's plan of attack, from MSE website, with one poster stating. it raises another issue...cancel those direct debits and risk default or leave all as is and keep the fingers crossed. Erudio have a lot to answer by running its business in such a shambolic fashion taking cash before they even have their system up and running, if that isnt newsworthy i dont know what is. This just isnt a joke. My stress levels had been contained for last couple of days, but they have just shot up again tonight.

Here is the message:
Despite my deferment being accepted by the SLC prior to the notification of the sale Erudio have today taken £133.33 from my bank account. This has caused me to go overdrawn.

I have spoken to one of Erudios advisers who was useless - he said that if I had a letter confirming deferment then that should be fine however stated that at the moment their systems cannot see who is/is not in a period of deferment. He also could not confirm when the payment, taken in error, would be refunded and that Erudio would not reimburse me for any bank charges incurred!

I am livid with the whole process

@ mandakl

I said a while ago I would post about why I thought these loans may have been mis-sold in the same way as PPI etc (probably harder to do when you are going against the government, rather than against a bank) but here is my reasoning, any comments welcomed!

1. the loans were 'sold' to students as interest free, yet when CPI was introduced which tends to be a lower rate of inflation loans were not linked to CPI. However loans to later students - also sold as interest free have been locked to lower rates of interest.

2, we have to pay back our loans after tax, yet at the time this was counted as income. Later students pay their's back after tax - presumably again the government realised they had made a mistake in the way our loans were sold. 3 it is always stated that only your own income would be counted in paying back the loan - this happens for later students, however for our loans money such as child benefit, child tax credits and maintenance payments for children are all included in the calculation figures - yet presumably these have been calculated at rates by the government as money needed to raise the children, not for the SLC/Erudio to claw back in again.

What the actual Castlemaine XXXX at that last comment from someone who had their deferred loan push out a payment to Erudio through the DD?! Cancel your DD's and DO IT NOW. If they are going to threaten your credit rating if you defer or threaten it if you default then what difference does it make? Seriously, if Erudio have absolutely no qualms about giving clear information, written confirmations etc, then why should you be worrying about whether they really will take money from your account? I think we all know that they will so why wait until they "cock" up?

Something else occurred to me earlier....

These are mortgage style loans, right?

If you have an actual mortgage and you make a lump payment, your monthly repayments adjust according to what you've paid off. With the mortgage style student loans this is not the case. You merely reduce the time that it will take to pay it off but the monthly repayment will remain the same. So how is that mortgage style?

Oops that should be at Erudioed!

about not giving written confirmation etc that should say.

Ha, I've had the same letter from BIS that was posted earlier.

Funny that when they say "Erudio are working hard to ensure..." bla bla bla, you have to wonder how BIS has become the Erudio customer service department.
[shocked]

Just marking thread so I can read everything through tomorrow waiting for my deferment letter so hopefully I can respond appropriately

and here is my response to BIS....

Dear Jacqueline

It's interesting that BIS are effectively doing Erudio's job by trying to suggest that they are working to ensure fairness.

I, along with many other borrowers can scan and email the clear change to the Terms and Conditions on the Erudio deferment forms which states if I defer, they will register this information with CRAs which was never part of the original agreement with SLC - by signing these forms I am agreeing to that change. Many of us are yet to receive any official written confirmations about Erudio's intentions so please don't patronise us with tales of treating us fairly. This is about a private company making a profit on debt the government wrote off to get it off the books. You have gifted a debt collection agency the power to threaten and intimidate people with debt that the government themselves have placed next to no value on.

Furthermore, if my loans are mortgage style then why doesn't a lump sum payment reduce the repayments? If I were to do this I would only reduce the length of time to repay and not reduce the monthly payments.

The government and yourselves are responsible for selling my loans for the equivalent of 5p in the Pound which makes the total worth of my loan considerably less than the £XXXX Erudio are asking me to pay. How can you justify this as treating the customer fairly?

Nothing about selling MY debt to a private company to make a profit is about treating me fairly.

Warm regards

Great just got my letter today confirming my 94-97 loans are now sold to Erudio. It is worded very well I must say. I will defer August time (hopefully) this thread has been great so will follow with interest.